An Unbelievable Throw?

[BretMan]

"Most of these people will accept that a young girl can throw a softball riser underhand."

And 100% of those people would be wrong.

That myth has been debunked with the use of video analysis. The study was done using a college D-1 pitcher who is generally regarded as having one of the best "risers" in the game, Sarah Pauley. Throughout her career she has been among the college leaders in strikeouts, with the "riser" her bread-and-butter pitch.

To a man- or woman- her teammates, coaches and the opposing players have all credited her pitch with "rising" through the strike zone. But when analyzed with video, where the trajectory of her "riser" could be easily tracked, this was found to not be the case.

The fact is, this "rise ball" as thrown by an accomplished D-1 college pitcher regarded as having one of the best "risers" in the game, was actually coming through the zone about flat with a couple of degrees of downward angle.

The conclusion of the study was that the "rise ball" does not rise. That is, it does not follow a gravity-defying upside-down parabolic path, like going up a ski jump.

Rather, the ball was simply not dropping at a rate the hitter's would normally see and was thus creating the illusion to be "rising".

If your premise is that "even a little girl can do it, so why not a big, strong man" your premise would be wrong. In reality, even a big, strong highly-trained and accomplished girl can't do it!

[Edited by BretMan on Mar 4th, 2006 at 05:59 PM]